Northrop Grumman hiring for new Va. office

Federal contractor Northrop Grumman is hiring employees to work in its new corporate headquarters in Falls Church, Virginia.

The move is rooted in a desire for the company to be closer to its government customers, said Randy Belote, Northrop's vice president of strategic communications.

The company is moving about 300 positions from its corporate office near Los Angeles, Belote said. About half of those new positions will likely be new hires, he added.

Also, employees in Northrop's Rosslyn, Va., office will be making the move. In all, the company currently has about 40,000 people in the Maryland, Virginia and Washington, D.C. region, according to the company website.

Despite the move, Northrop is not abandoning California, where 30,000 employees will remain.

"We hear all these horror stories of Northrop pulling up stakes and moving tens of thousands of employees out of California. That's not the case," Belote said.

Belote said the company has been considering a headquarter move after concluding a "fairly large acquisition phase" in the early 2000s. Northrop announced in April 2010 it was going to relocate its corporate office to Falls Church after a search for buildings in the D.C. region.